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Howdy – Chris is well & loving chocolate icecreams & curries – needs a haircut though, the scruff. ‘Stroke’ is drawing near to it’s mastering stage. We’re looking at a release party & booking a venue. Revolution#9 in mono is soooooo much better than in stereo. Abbey Road remaster is a religious experience – close yer eyes & you can see ’em! John would have bin 69 today. Sob.

Hi All – Chris is having a quiet weekend. We did some work on the new Tall Dwarfs album on Saturday after attempting to watch DVDs (nobody ever mention ‘aspect ratio’ to me). Then we did some work on completing ‘Stroke’ – I should receive the remainder of the tracks in the next two weeks & then we’re into production.

Hiya – On Friday night we showed Chris the artwork that Alec has done for ‘Stroke’ and played him some of the tracks that we’ve received. It was a neat moment & Chris was thrilled to hear the interpretations of his songs. The next day (as reported in the last blog) we went into the studio to add our own track (Chris Knox & The Nothing) to the album – and it was great for Chris to be back with a band with a microphone in his hand belting out tunes in a free-form, Ono-esque manner. We had so much fun we thought we should make a record at some point in the not-to-distant future. It is amazing & weird that the stroke has taken speech away (for the time being) but left Chris’ musicality intact. Having recording projects ahead (incl The Tall Dwarfs) gives Chris’ musicality focus and meaning.

On Sunday we watched a Brian Wilson live DVD which Chris enjoyed. He’s also been for a swim for the first time since the stroke. He’s gagging for a beer (who wouldn’t be?) but being responsible types (well, some of us) we’ve put the kibosh on that for the time being.

Spewing ACDC riffs, blues standards & free jazz The Nothing briefly reformed at Intellectually Handicapped Studios East for a performance for an elite group of music fans. Muff’s drum sound was perfected when the one mic the bone-idle engineer had allowed him for the drums fell off the stand and rolled under the kit. Ron’s guitar sound had finally been perfected with the discovery of Jim Dunlop 2″ picks which finally gave him that elusive tone he had been seeking, finally. Biff’s Ibanez bass scoured the room like a rutting warthog. Christofur’s jangly squeaks & squeals summoned forth all his demons and joy mingled together like so much mingled belly-button fluff, and reminded everyone of the “Dunedin sound” (finally available as a ProTools Plug-In for EU$195 from ‘wheresmyfamegoneandwhydoesnooneknowwhoiamanymore.org.com.nz’ – expander pack comes with Poor Management, Inability to Stop, and 90dB Bannister Detector)

It was all captured by yours truly, Ray Martini, on my trusty Porta-Tape Analogue Replicating Cassette Plug-In Tape Analogue Tube Vintage TEAC 412/PC Series 3b 1″ Ultra-Tape 35 Track as used by The Beatles for the backwards snare sound on Drive My Car. It was all trapped in glorious mono (‘less width more depth’ was my slogan goddamit!) and I will soon use every processing digit of ProTools to edit out all signs of life.

It was great to see the boys back together after all Cynthia’s trials of the past 6 months. He was rewaxed and ployful for the entire weakend afterwards.The charges against him being the real talent of the band seem to be subsiding and a basic form of humidity is emerging.

Ron, however, was still the perfectionist, demanding micro-tonal changes to Muff’s drums – he had actually arranged for a drum-tech to be flown in from LA to tune the 20 piece Gretsch kit that Warners had hired for the occasion, but her flight was diverted due to Imelda Marcos deciding she had been snubbed enough times already. Muff & Ron fought bitterly over the upcoming plan for Ron’s solo blues album, tenatively titled ‘Greyphis’, after Ron’s belief that Grey Lynn is the new Memphis, & that he is John Lee Hooker’s lovechild (which, Muff delighted in pointing out, simply couldn’t be true genetically speaking as Ron was “as white as man”).

Muff was looking clean, lean, mean & wholly gluten-free. His year of astral travel in the ashram at Portland Oregan had almost robbed him of the will to play rock drums as he had discovered his art was of hasidic and aboriginal roots and Boom Chak was a far cry from the unfettered artiness of being arty. He had decided to detune his lifestyle to a drop B# tuning that was post-rock but in a highly musical way.

Time has however not been so kind to Biff. His time off hard drugs has left him oddly personable – which none of us could stand. His upcoming weeding to a Greek supermodel seems like avoidance behaviour and we’re hoping to see him juiced to the eyeballs again soon. Still worse he has contracted an incurable advertising condition and will be on our screeds soon.

For me personally it was a great moment & all the intervening years of fame & turmoil seemed to melt away and once again I was just ol’ Ray the tape op & the lads tousled my hair and offered me chip butties & cups of tea just like in the old days.

The moors rustled with the deep pulsing of the wind. The moon gave a surreal icey-blue glaze to the heather. The lone Knox wandered the grassy knolls, nose twitching, for new prey. Shadows of the limping, leering, lunging Knox swept over the heather in patches of dark. The slow ‘schllllffff-thunk, schllllfff-thunk’ of his gait would warn all but the most unsuspecting of creatures of his approach. The tiny paneer-mouse (recently imported on the whim of a drunken Botswanan on the firm, but misguided, belief that its fur, dried, crushed & strained into a tea, would cure his gout) however had not had its ears cleaned recently at the Hearing Association in Remuera, and therefore its hearing was not as acute as it could have been.

The Knox spied his prey, and with the four-prongs of his barely used (and therefore almost sterile) walking stick pinned the four legs of the paneer-mouse to the ground – thus ensuring a minimum of damage to its delicious non-vegetarian flesh. He threw himself on his victim & with his rather well kept teeth ripped the fur (which was in fact totally useless for anything at all) off the screaming animal & threw its tiny carcass, still writhing in agony, into the local microwave to curry for tea (with some left-over rice to provide carbs).

Replete, the Knox lay to briefly shuffle no more as slumber engulfed the weary denizen of the night – his nostrils still twitched with the thrill of the kill & his grey bristle was smeared with the paneer-mouse’s remnants, which hung in the moon-light as a terrible warning to other paneer-mice of the unpleasant fate that awaits those that choose to turn a deaf ear.

Hi All – A quiet weekend for Chris – so I don’t have a great deal to report today. Last night Roger Shepherd came to visit him & we played more poker. Roger played crap all night but won the entire pot on the last hand with three aces. Accusations of cheating ensued and Chris slipped a derringer out from behind his arm brace, simultaneously accusing Roger of swindling him out of past royalties and ruining his career. Tensions heightened when Roger pointed out that beyond a few weirdos & bread-lovers no one really took Chris’ music seriously, and he hadn’t sold a great deal of records anyway, particularly not compared to Neil Finn, and I noticed Roger’s hand inch towards the bread knife, left on the poker table from cutting Chris’ birthday cake. As a hapless innocent bystander I took it upon myself to protect Chris & threw myself, selflessly, on the blade – luckily Roger was diverted by the cup of dandelion tea that was offered by Liesha and the knife glanced off the Mountain Goats CD I had in my pocket, and embedded itself quivering into his three aces. Being deeply superstitious types we all agreed that a sign had been revealed to us and all have sworn off dandelion tea as it obviously distorts objectives – and everyone pledged to be nicer to goats.

Am hungover. Alcohol bad. Coffee good. Those darn friendly-types at Pastis who just hafta introduce me to Calvados after a night of beers’n’cider’n’wine’n’pernod’ oh’n’at-least-one vodka…. Looked at blog & realised I have been slacking – sorry folks.

Chris had a good weekend with plenty of visitors. We watched The Hunchback Of Notre Dame (1939 version) – seen it before of course, but fab movie. Was tempted to make connected jokes about Chris’ new physique with straps & buckles & related distortions, but held off on the grounds that my taste can be very questionable at times – my recent pillow gag re ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest’ Chris didn’t appreciate very much.

Ant Timpson came over with his new baby boy who Chris enjoyed meeting (kids & pets a big deal at the moment). Ant very kindly asked me what films from the last festival I thought Chris would be interested in seeing on DVD and I hafta admit that I substituted the films that I wanted to see ….. uhh ….. but you’d do the same in my position…. right? … right?

Chris is boppin’ around the house now without any need for his walking stick & was in a pretty cheery & Chris-like mood all weekend. Beautiful day in Auckland and lounging on the back deck was popular.

Tomorrow is the big day for the Mono boxset – tens of crazed Beatle loons won’t be sleeping tonight. I’ll be picking up Chris’ set first thing and of course I will be waiting for him to open it & have a listen, of course I will, I wouldn’t dream of anything else…..

It is totally true that you can’t Beatle too much. Go Beatle now – go on – you know you want to – it’s good for you – it really is – start with uhhhhh – ‘Dear Prudence’

Hi All – I spent Saturday hanging out with Chris. We watched a film from 1931 called ‘A Free Soul’ with Clark Gable of all people – good fun. Then we were in for a real treat when Graham Reid & Chris Caddick (thanks guys) brought round a promo sampler of the new Beatle remasters – we were very impressed – brighter sure, cleaner yup, but also more vibrant as if less compressed, by the time we got to ‘I’ve Got A Feeling’ I was a quivering wreck & snapping at anyone who ventured toward the stereo controls (sorry Liesha). It’s hard to read Chris at times but he seemed happy about what he was hearing, and kept holding up 4 fingers which we took to mean 4-out-of-five. Now the awful question of whether to buy the mono or stereo versions ……….. of course it should be mono … but then the way they’ve released them means you don’t get all the albums so you kinda need both sets …… arrgggghhh.

Chris was bright & engaged all weekend although he’s managed to communicate t us that he isn’t sleeping well so we need to sort out some medication for him. He’s starting to dispense with his walking stick for longer periods which is good to see as long as he doesn’t have a fall. In the last two days a few friends have noticed more words coming back to him which is very encouraging, although I gotta say Friday was a bit rough for me as I missed my friend as he used to be.

Hi All – We had a neat night last night with the launch of the new New Artland series and an art auction fund-raiser for the Stroke Foundation of New Zealand. In excess of $40,000 dollars was raised so a big round of applause goes to Russell, Gemma & Cathy for organising the event. Thanks to all the artists who contributed work, and thanks to Sean, Paul, and Will for the music. My own thanks to Sam and Selena for helping out with the PA and lights. Thanks to everyone else for singing happy birthday to me!

Poor Chris has been laid out with a filthy cold this week. Monday was particularly rough on him – coughing & spluttering and delivering foul specimens to the world from the dank abyss that his lungs had become. However he’s been improving & he wanted to come to the launch last night, but the decision was made that he was still too unwell to attend.

Curses to the person that bid $300 on the Beatle mono box-set thus removing it from my clutches!